MBA Position Statement

Why not choose your method of hunting Big Game in Montana using only a Bow or only a Rifle?

By Gary Carvajal, President, Montana Bowhunters Association

The Montana Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks has presented a topic for discussion requiring hunters to choose whether to hunt with either a bow or rifle, not both; in other words, an Either/Or scenario.

Our topic focus is the general and archery season structure for residents only. Limited entry and draw areas or hunts are excluded. Reference to a rifle refers to any firearm legal to hunt big game in Montana. A bow refers to any archery equipment legal to hunt big game in Montana. The topic refers to hunting opportunity for elk and deer, not the killing of big game animals or harvest success rates.

The purpose of this document is to challenge the assumptions of requiring either bow only or rifle only as a possible policy for hunting big game in Montana.

Secondly, there may be an understandable concern by bow hunters, rifle hunters and others concerning the wounding of animals and the non-recovery of animals. As well, the issue of ethical hunting practices is important to all. As a result, we will also examine these two issues as they relate to bow hunters:

A) bow hunters are assumed to produce a higher rate of unacceptable wounding or un-recovered animals by bow hunters than rifle hunters;

B) bow hunters are assumed to have higher rates of unethical or unlawful hunting behavior than do rifle hunters.

What is the data?

Currently in Montana, as of 2006, the big game archery season starts on the first Saturday in September and runs to the second Sunday in October, a period of six weeks. A big game rifle hunter may hunt elk and deer during the general season that begins on the third Sunday in October and runs to the last Sunday in November, a period of five weeks.

A hunter may hunt elk and deer, first with an archery license and then with a general hunting license for a total of eleven weeks. During the general rifle season an archer may hunt with either a bow or a rifle.

In 2005 the following licenses were sold to resident hunters in Montana for hunting:

Total Resident Hunting Licenses	188,299
Resident Elk Licenses	125,245
Resident Deer Licenses	151,603
Resident Archery Licenses	29, 947

It seems reasonable to assume the following:

a) Some bowhunters tended to hunt in both seasons, the archery and general season.
b) Some bowhunters tended to hunt both elk and deer in the archery and general season.
c) Non-bow rifle hunters hunt in the general season.

These numbers tell us that up to 23.9 percent of the elk hunters and 19.7 percent of the deer hunters hunted with a bow in the archery as well as hunted with either a rifle or bow in the general season.

With this assumption, potentially up to 23.9 percent of the elk hunters and 19.7 percent of the deer hunters in the state had eleven weeks of opportunity available.

The Montana Bowhunters Association (MBA) conducted a survey of its members and found that:

• In 1999 64.9 percent of the members hunt with both bow and rifle.
• In 2001 67.1 percent of the members hunt with both bow and rifle.

An average of 66% or 2/3 of MBA members hunt with both bow and rifle, per the survey responses. The MBA has about 900 members. They constitute approximately 3 percent of the resident purchasers of archery licenses in Montana.

Let us assume that roughly the same 66 percent ratio for the 2005 license year of the 29,947 archery license buyers in the state. This suggests that approximately 19,765 of them hunt with both bow and rifle in the archery and general hunting seasons. Let us round these two numbers to 30,000 and 20,000 bow and rifle hunters respectively.

This suggests that approximately 20,000 hunters in this state could face either the loss of six weeks of archery hunting opportunity if they have to choose a rifle. If choosing a bow, they could face the loss of five weeks of rifle hunting opportunity. These hunters choosing a bow, could not use a rifle even if they had a closet full of them.

Examination of the logic supporting the premise
for the discussion of Either/Or

As stated previously, currently a bow hunter, who only hunts with a bow in both the archery and general season, has up to eleven weeks of total opportunity. This hunter has already made a conscious “either/or” decision, regardless of the current regulations. The rifle hunter who does not hunt with a bow has likewise already made a choice. Making those hunters formally select his or her method of hunting would be only a technicality No problem here? Right? –Wrong! We need only look to what the past can teach us.

In the past, where and when I started hunting in the late sixties, if you wanted to hunt in many western states, for instance in New Mexico, in Utah or Colorado, it was similar to what we currently have in Montana. In the seventies and early eighties, you could buy a license and an archery license, and hunt the archery season and the rifle season, and in some cases a late season. You could use a bow or rifle in the rifle season; no different than what we have now.

Then in the eighties, these states started to make changes. At first, hunters had to choose either a bow or rifle to hunt with, like this discussion just beginning now in Montana.

Then came restrictions as to the seasons themselves and the methods with which it was legal to hunt.

Now archery hunters in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah, for instance, can only hunt with archery gear only in the archery season. The bow hunters cannot hunt the rifle seasons with a bow. The rifle hunter numbers increased in the rifle season. Then there was overcrowding, and New Mexico and Colorado have now broken down the previous long rifle seasons into multiple segments of three, four, and six or up to ten-day periods. Now a rifle hunter has to not only designate which period or season segment, but in some cases, what unit they are going to hunt.

This first thing that occurred in these three states that I am fully aware of and have personal experience with, was a requirement for hunters to choose their method either to hunt with a bow or with a rifle.

If “either/or” were to be adopted in Montana, what does the future hold for bow hunters here? If the lessons of the past from our neighbors to the south are any indication, before long a bow hunter will be required to pick their method, and then after a while, the ability to hunt in the general season will cease. Montana bow hunters will be finished hunting on the second Sunday in October.

No more bowhunting the rut for whitetail or mule deer in November. No more bowhunting late-season elk traveling down to the winter ranges in late October and November. Many opportunities will be gone forever. That game management tool will be lost.

If Either/Or is adopted, what does the future hold for rifle hunters in Montana? Again using the past as a prism, our rifle or general season will become segmented, again reducing opportunity.

The past history of other states provides a path we would not probably want to travel down.

Loss of Revenue

If an Either/Or scenario is adopted, the Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks will suffer a significant loss of revenue. There could be up to 20,000 archery licenses at $8.00 each, or $160,000 that might not be purchased. Couple that with matching Pittman-Robertson dollars the Department would not get and the figure becomes substantial indeed.

Take up to 20,000 potential bowhunters out of the economic equation for the purchase of equipment, traveling to and from their hunting areas, hotels, and other expenses, and the State of Montana, especially small rural communities, loses a pretty big chunk of dollars being circulated. Outfitters, guides and their services in the archery season would suffer as well.

Wounding and Ethical Issues

The first concern of assumed bowhunter wounding and loss is based on anecdotal and incorrect evidence.

Citing a Montana Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks publication: “Effects of Archery Hunting on Elk Management in Montana” Published by MT DFWP, January 1989; A Report to the Fifty-first Montana Legislature

Excerpts from this report:

• Elkhorn Mountains – Based on the fate of 212 radio marked elk, the effects of archery hunting on the elk population in this area was not great. During the 1982 through 1987 period, archery hunting accounted for on 6.0% (3.4% legal and 2.6% wounding) of total elk mortality. In comparison, rifle hunting accounted for an average of 70.1% (66.7% legal and 3.4% wounding) of total annual elk mortality.
• The Gravelly Mountains – Since 1984, 4 (3.7%) of the 110 documented hunter kills of 374 marked animals available to hunters have been due to archery hunting. One of these was a crippling loss. Of the 106 marked elk taken by rifle hunters, 5 were crippling losses. Thus far, the proportion of hunter kills of marked elk is small, and reestablishing archery hunting in HD 324 in 1988 did not seem to change this appreciably.

The Departments’ own research and reporting indicates that overall wounding and loss ratios are less with archery than with rifle hunting. The concern is not supported by the data.

Add to this data: The Camp Ripley Research Report on the Camp Ripley National Guard Camp in Minnesota. This report was done over a two-year period in 1992 and 1993 to determine the effect of bowhunting on whitetail deer.

The Camp Ripley report summation supports that wounding and loss ratios of deer were relatively low. Rifle hunting wounding and loss data was not a part of this report or of the research.

The Archery Manufacturers and Merchants Organization (AMO) report, “The facts about bowhunting and target archery,” cite these and numerous other supporting data.

Anecdotal evidence is not fact.

While this research and the published data is over ten years old, it is still relevant. Who is to say what the current wounding and lost numbers are, let alone what percentage of that unknown number is not socially or biologically acceptable? No one knows. Until current and scientifically reliable data on bow hunter wounding can be collected and analyzed, to consider a sweeping season or method of hunting selection is foolhardy.

The second concern of bowhunter ethics practices being in some cases sub-standard is not only a practical concern but a social and political concern as well.

One possible premise those who advocate either bow hunting only or rifle hunting only is that incidental bow hunters would be eliminated from the bow hunting ranks, and that by default the standard of dedication would raise the ethical standard.

One might assume that only those ethically dedicated and confident enough would choose to use a bow only. Better ethical behavior would occur as the non-dedicated bow hunters moved to the ranks of the rifle hunter. Or would it?

This is a very questionable assumption. I would not want to assume that those former unethical bow hunters choosing to hunt with a rifle only in the “either/or” scenario would then contribute to the ranks of unethical rifle hunters. Would only bow hunters with high ethical standards choose to hunt with only a bow? Of course not. For that to be true, then the unethical bow hunter becomes an unethical rifle hunter. Clearly the issue of hunting ethics is important, but must apply to both bow and rifle hunters alike. It is not germane to this “either/or” policy discussion.

As to the issue or concern of curing or finding a solution to unethical behavior by a minority of some bow hunters, regulation or legislation is ineffective in achieving positive results. Certain restrictions, raising or elevating qualifications of being able to be a bow hunter, might be a way to start some positive movement. But that subject is a separate issue unto itself.

Loss of youth interest and recruitment

The future of bowhunting lies in being able to keep enough young people entering the sport. As a Bowhunter Education Instructor in Missoula, we have about 400 students through the program per year. About 3500 students statewide take the course annually. More than half are below the age of 21, a third below 16 years of age. Those young people not able to go hunting by themselves until they are able to drive, or physically able to be off on their own, will be hunting with an older family member or friend. If that family member or friend does not nor cannot bowhunt, the youngster will not be exposed to it. Many of our younger bowhunters spend their first few years hunting with firearms. Only because they do not have to choose which method they are going to hunt with, these same young hunters have an opportunity to be exposed to bowhunting. If the opportunity for them to bowhunt is taken away by a weapon choice being mandated, the number of young archers will drop precipitously.

Most bowhunters started out hunting with firearms in their youth, to deny them the ability they now enjoy to bowhunt and to hunt with firearms without having to make a choice is to limit their participation.

Impacts on the MBA and its members

Since about 2/3 of the MBA members hunt with a bow as well as rifle, in both seasons, there would likely be a substantial reduction of members if the MBA leadership were to pursue an “either/or” season. A point of conjecture exists whether the organization could survive taking a policy position that could have such an impact on a majority of the members. Let’s assume a worst case scenario, if 2/3 of the members left the group, would there be enough members left to keep the MBA as a viable force for the bowhunters of the state of Montana? Would we want to pull the pin on a grenade, toss it into a phone booth, step inside and close the door behind us? The outcomes may be similar.

Final Comment

Making hunters choose their method of hunting with either a rifle or bow is the wrong solution to a problem that simply does not exist. To make 30,000 resident hunters now choose how they want to hunt instead of letting them hunt, is just plain wrong.

For the Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks to consider the adoption of a choose your method, “either/or” approach to all Montana’s hunters based on the reasons stated, is simply incorrect management by incorrect and scientifically unsupportable information.

The current data does not support the perception of unacceptable wounding and loss by bowhunters. Either/Or will result in reduced opportunity for bow and rifle hunters. Reduction of opportunity results in further problems of managing game animal numbers as well loss of revenue. Everyone loses, especially our game animals.

Presented by Gary Carvajal, President, Montana Bowhunters Association—
October 15, 2006

RESOURCES

1. Montana Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks: “Effects of Archery Hunting on Elk Management in Montana” Published by MT DFWP, 1989.
2. Archery Manufacturers and Merchants Organization (AMO): “The facts about bowhunting and target archery” Link to Web site: http://www.sportsclubs.uct.ac.za/archery/documents/BowhuntingBook.pdf.
3. Kreuger, Wendy J. 1995, “Aspects of Wounding of Whitetailed Deer by Bow-Hunters”, MS Thesis, School of Agriculture and Forestry, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV.